Mobile Text Marketing - When NOT to Pay Attention to It

Silicone Awareness Rings to help prevent texting while driving.

Silicone Awareness Rings from Promo With Purpose Shop.com

Most of you have noticed that I’m encouraging everyone to begin to “mobilize” their businesses with mobile text message marketing. But there is one time when I definitely would encourage you NOT to pay attention to it. And that’s while you’re driving.

Need convincing as to why? Check these stats from Distraction.gov, the official government website for distracted driving (yes, there is such a site):

Of those killed in distracted-driving-related crashed, 995 involved reports of a cell phone as a distraction (18% of fatalities in distraction-related crashes). (NHTSA)
Drivers who use hand-held devices are 4 times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves. (Source: Insurance Institute for Highway Safety)
Using a cell phone use while driving, whether it’s hand-held or hands-free, delays delays a driver’s reactions as much as having a blood alcohol concentration at the legal limit of .08 percent. (Source: University of Utah)

You might be surprised that the age group with the highest proportion of fatal crashes resulting from cell phone distractions is the 30 to 39-year old category. Even more frightening is that a 2009 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration survey estimates that at any given time, 9 percent of all vehicles had drivers using some kind of phone, either hand held or hands free. That, in my opinion, means that there’s about 9 percent of the traffic around me with the potential to cause an accident from being distracted.

But there is some good news from this 2009 survey. Nationwide, drivers who were observed visibly manipulating hand-held electronic devices dropped significantly from 1.0 percent to 0.6 percent. As well, some 1.1 percent of drivers 16 to 24 years old were observed visibly manipulating hand-held electronic devices, which was down from 1.7 percent the previous year.

I think key to this decrease has been awareness of the dangers of texting while driving or “Hang Up & Drive” campaigns. And here’s a cool new promotional product for those efforts: silicone “Awareness Rings” which are similar to those silicone wristbands that have been popular in recent years. Check out the video!

Awareness Promotion to Prevent Texting While Driving

I wore these awareness rings to a recent networking event and as I drove around for errands. Did get attention! A young, definitely Gen Y’er at the Starbucks thought they were cool no matter what they were promoting and said he’d wear something like that for sure. Though perfect for DWT (Driving While Texting) awareness, consider for other awareness issues, too.

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